in 2020, i managed a Democratic campaign in an R+30 district

let me tell you why running candidates everywhere matters

not every campaign is about winning

i know that it sounds backwards, but if you go into every single race with winning as your only metric of success, you not only doom yourself to disappointment, but you also have a very short-term view of what it means to succeed

our team went into the 2020 campaign cycle knowing that the deck was stacked against us

in a blood-red district and the most powerful repubican in North Carolina as the incumbent, you simply don't go into a campaign expecting to win

you have to measure success differently

entering the cycle, the county's Democratic party was on its last legs

the biggest reason? in a county with a substantially populated university, there was virtually no youth engagement with local politics

so that became a measure of our success

we built a campaign whose purpose was to bring young people into the fold of the local party. we decided that increasing engagement among college-aged voters was the purpose that we were there to serve

did we win? of course not, and if that had been our only measure of success then we would rightfully consider the campaign a failure

but it wasn't

did we bring young people into the fold of local politics? absolutely we did

and by doing so, even though we lost, we contributed to the long-term health of the Democratic party in a currently unwinnable part of the state

the lead line in my bio (and my mantra) is "organize everyone, organize everywhere"

this is exactly how we should organize. long-term investment in every single community in the country

without campaigns that are "destined to lose," we never ever change hearts and minds

while you’re here and thinking about down-ballot candidates, please support my good friend @Kendall4MO!

Kendall is running as a Black, Latinx, LGBTQ woman in Missouri’s 5th state house district https://secure.actblue.com/donate/kendall4mo